


The Briar Path

by DarthFucamus



Category: Darkest Dungeon (Video Game)
Genre: Combat, Depressive Setting, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gore, Lewd Limericks, Masklophilia, Masks, Small Fic Challenge, Vaginal Sex, Witty Banter, the mask stays on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-01-28
Packaged: 2019-10-18 08:26:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17577353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthFucamus/pseuds/DarthFucamus
Summary: The Jester and the Hellion are the last two standing in a dire situation. Death is a certainty unless they work together.Did this as a challenge together with FancyLadySnackCakes, who thirsts after the same kinds of characters as I do, with a hard cap at 3k. Enjoy!FancyLadySnackCakes fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17577062





	The Briar Path

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Liberating Throngs](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17577062) by [FancyLadySnackCakes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FancyLadySnackCakes/pseuds/FancyLadySnackCakes). 



> Thanks to FancyLadySnackCakes for doing this writing challenge with me! 
> 
> Her Jester/Musketeer fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17577062

The beast sprayed its black innards over Theda the Hellion as its waxy grey putrescent flesh split along her glaive edge. The stench of pigman offal was perfume to her nose as it spilled to the floor. With a triumphant snarl, Theda flung the dead body aside.

Another enemy executed with impunity.

But the pleasure was short-lived. Orsom the Occultist, who’d been muttering incoherently for the last half-day, finally snapped at the grating tympany of the hog drummer’s beat.

With a shriek, the turbaned mystic barreled past Theda before she could grab onto his flapping robes. Blindly swinging his arcane censer, he flew ahead...

Right into the front rank of the enemy, where his skull met the spiked ball of a swinging morningstar. Stuck for a moment, the Swine Chopper’s attempts to dislodge him shook the semblance of frenetic life into Orsom’s limbs until his body hit the stone floor, definitely dead.

Theda’s heart flopped in her gut when confronted with the glistening ruins of what had been the face of the last remaining healer.

The Jester, having just bandaged his own wound, saw Orsom die and uttered a sharp curse. Falling to his knees, he clutched at his covered face. This was Theda’s first mission with him, and though she was surprised by his show of emotion for their fallen ally, this was no time to mourn.

“Jester, to arms!” Theda rallied her last party member, calling forth the will to bolster from somewhere even as the horrors of her own mind clawed from the abyss to choke the light.

His headpiece jingled when he looked at her, two eyes in a featureless white sackcloth face, and he… laughed.

Mad or brave? The Hellion couldn’t tell the difference anymore. Perhaps in this dark place, with their last torch burning to embers, haunted by the fallen, it would take both to survive.

She took heart in the Jester’s good humor either way and, sucking in a great breath that strained the leather side fasteners for her armor plate, Theda bellowed a fearsome battle cry. Stunned by the force of her brutal yawp, the drummer staggered back onto the points of a hidden spike trap.

The swine chopper shook off its daze much sooner and readied an indefensible killing blow when a flash of motley red and gold entered her periphery and-

_Shick_

Metal hooked between armor plates and into unguarded swine flesh. With a buoyant grunt, the Jester jerked back on his sickle, dragging a rope of entrails with the movement. The last enemy fell, and Theda almost didn’t notice how the world was tipping sideways until the Jester turned to her, concerned.

From the floor, she swatted him away. Irrational anger took control once the dizziness receded.

“Fine for you, isn’t it!!” she snapped, scarcely aware of what she was saying. “You leave me unguarded, then steal my kill at the last moment!”

The Jester pulled back with a musical tinkle, his stark white sackcloth mask unreadable but for the shallow contours of the face underneath. Somehow, he looked affronted. She hated him at that moment.

Theda tried to wrangle her focus. Why was she so angry?

“The room is clear. Let’s camp,” he said, unfazed.

\-----

The Jester strummed his lute before the fire, his long fingers gloved in red. With his foot propped up on the other knee, back bowed and leaning against a crumbled pillar, he acted as though he were lounging amidst luxury.

Theda had threatened to use the instrument as kindling, but once the unshakable buffoon began playing, she found herself hating him a little less. Perhaps her ire for him was misplaced battle weariness.

Lacking an enemy to absorb her wrath, her heart sank into a stagnant mire of hopelessness.

“I’d hoped to be rid of this place sooner. I will not be able to sleep a wink within its foul, moldering walls,” Theda said, cleaning her nails with a dagger. “I will take first watch.”

“No thankee,” the Jester said, eyeing her activity as he absently played. ”Not after you promised to throttle me about the throat.”

Theda huffed. 

“My warrior’s spleen spoke those words, not I,” she said, sheathing her dagger after some thought.

“Warrior’s spleen, eh? From another angle, such aimless rage could be sign of unseen battle wounds. Ones which cut deeper than flesh.”

The tune was melancholic but calming. The shadows in her brain stopped reaching so far or scratching so deep. What he’d said of invisible wounds struck true, but spite wouldn’t allow her to admit it.

“What know you of such matters, fool? The mummer’s stage is your battlefield.”

He quirked his head at her, and now the tune he strummed changed. It settled into a more soothing range, the highs softer, the lows warm and velvety. He shifted his instrument, showing her the smooth, round belly of it, without faltering in the melody.

“Miss Lutie bears a mark for each man I’ve slain. Even were her sweet voice taken from me, the tally is well-kept on my soul.”

Theda squinted by firelight at the underside of the lute. There were dozens upon dozens of even scratches in the touch-polished and well-loved wood. She sat back, humbled by the lack of artifice in his words. All remaining trace of ire melted from her bearing, leaving only world-weariness. She stifled a yawn with a closed fist.

“Forgive me, Jester, I hardly know you… indeed, you have fought well at my side this far.”

His fingers slid along the frets, moving independently to produce the melody.

“Well enough for you to call me Jaxx?'” he asked. She couldn’t see his true eyes, but when he tilted his head a certain way, their moist surface reflected flames. He was just a man, as tired as she. 

“Aye. Jaxx it is. And I’m Theda, Hellion of the Highland clans.”

The fabric over his mouth pulled and she could almost see a manic grin in the way the folds caught shadows.

“O fearless goddess of battle,” Jaxx began to sing, his conversational mid-tone switching to a soft, lilting tenor. “Strong, bonny, and true. Count thy vic’tries in thy dreams, and wake at morn renewed.”

It was a sonorous ballad meant for fairer settings, and subjects. Theda watched the firelight dance on the ceiling. Sleepy, but the rock under her head made a poor pillow.

“Drip your courtly honeyed sop in some other’s ears,” she said, failing to hold back another yawn. “It bores me.”

Jaxx chuckled. The lute continued. Resonant, uplifting chords seemed to buff away the dirt from battle.

“T’was a brutish maiden in Choux,” he sang, losing the saccharine affectation for a voice more natural and, frankly, more pleasing to her weary ears. “Unwed, yet suitors were few. Til came a man penitent, a masochistic Flagellant, said he, ‘my dreams have come true!’”

Theda chortled, crossing her ankles and resting the back of her head on the crook of her arm comfortably.

“That’s more my speed,” she said, taking a deep breath for what felt like the first time in days. Too bad it was foul crypt air, but it still felt good.

“Rest your eyes and worry not,” the Jester said, softer, the firelight painting the fibers of his covered face in warm, buttery tones. “Jaxxy here will take first watch.”

She considered that the music he played was bewitched, because she no longer felt like arguing with him. Sleep came to her quickly.

\-----

When she woke, it was black as pitch and the weight of a slender body was atop hers. Her eyes narrowed, thinking the Jester not only a deviant but a suicidal one at that, until she heard the soft snuffling elsewhere in the closed space.

They’d been set upon in the night! Had Jaxx so grievously failed in his duties? Theda’s body tensed under him, but she didn’t move, thinking to take measure of the situation before acting. When she turned her head aside to spy the source of the grunting and sniffing, she thanked the well-rested sense of reason that had stayed her hand.

A Swine Retch had managed to intrude their refuge in search of meat. This weaker breed of beast man never strayed far from others of its kind, within distant earshot at least. Should it notice them, it might bring its squealing brethren down upon them. Jaxx held a finger before the mouth of his pale face, an entreaty for stealth.

He’d been wise not to attack; only a seasoned warrior might have a solid chance of felling it with a single blow.

But… the timing was ill. Theda had her few hours of sleep, but Jaxx was surely near his limit. Time for strategy.

Closing her eyes, Theda tried to center herself by counting the minor battles that had led her to this point. The present situation kept drawing her focus, namely the man whose weight pressed her iron belt buckle into her abdomen.

A minor adjustment, the tilt of her pelvis, caused Jaxx’s knee to shift to the side and slide between her thighs. Her muscles tensed to feel him there, but the faint jingle of a bell made them both freeze. Both pairs of eyes locked on the Retch only a couple strides away.

It had found Orsom’s body, buried nearby as best as was possible beneath a pile of loose stones. The beast’s gnawing drowned out all other noise.

Theda gestured, and with a subtle nod, Jaxx pushed himself upright. On his own, he moved with perfect silence despite the bells. Dark slashed eye holes tilted knowingly. He gave as much room as she needed to reach the dirk sheathed in his low-slung waist belt without moving off her entirely.

Theda tested the weapon’s balance and estimated the distance as best she could. Her arm flexed back, then hurled it as stealthily as a striking owl. The dirk found its mark between the swine retch’s eyes; it gave a startled gasp, then fell over dead.

A lucky hit, and with the intruder dispatched, she let the joy spill from her mouth in a primal, albeit discreet, ululation. Jaxx chuckled, in no hurry to move away from her. The sound of his raspy voice seized Theda with sudden fire.

She pushed herself upright and tipped him backward onto the floor. She pinned him like a grappler, growling and arching her back, invigorated by the bloodshed.

“Think me ‘bonny,’ do you?” she demanded, baring her teeth in a wild grin.

“Aye. And never moreso than after a kill,” he said with a husky growl.

Dusty gloved hands crept up either side of her thighs, walking under her tattered skirts, and hooked onto her thigh bands. Making sport after battle was Theda’s preferred stress relief, but she had suppressed the desire in her service to their benefactor, out of interest in propriety.

“Your hands are eager, Jester, yet you have kept watch for hours. Mayhaps your strength is better kept in reserve,” she said, only half-teasing as she felt for the opening into his clothes.

“And miss this chance? Nay, my brawny beauty. Your fool hasn’t played his entire hand just yet.”

He nudged up with his hips and guided her searching hands to his buckle wherein was hidden a flask and beneath that, the garb’s fasteners.

Propriety was less important on the precipice of doom.

Theda barked a laugh, unbuckling his belt, and removed the flask. As she opened the flask to drink, Jaxx jerked her down over his hardening crotch by her thigh cuffs. The ridge of his stiffening member mashed against her nethers just so and she hummed appreciation as she gulped the fiery liquid. Half was gone before she could even think to ask what it was she’d drunk. The whiskey was laced with traces of bitter wormwood, medicinal but poisonous in great amounts.

Her fingertips found the divot of his mouth and she tipped the flask against the fabric. His lips opened and gripped the flask’s mouth. Gulping the fluid through the fibers, his fingertips dug hard into her thighs as he ground into her from beneath with surprising strength.

He gasped for breath and her lips found the damp spot soaked with booze where he’d drunk. She suckled the taste from the woven cloth, all but kissing him.

“That was… more than the recommended draught,” he said, breathy and hoarse, likely from the same burn Theda had in her throat and chest.

“We drink to the fallen,” Theda said, running her tongue over her teeth.

“And to those who will rise again,” Jaxx said, now bracing his feet against the downed pillar for leverage. The Jester helped her up to stand with him. Their bodies met with a gleeful cacophony of tiny bells, eager hands roaming over clothes, savoring bare skin; he pushed, she gave ground. Holding him, Theda buried her face in his dusty hood until her back hit a wall.

She wrapped her thighs about his waist. His agile hands freely hurried to remove obstructions. Her iron belt disc hit the floor with a solid clank, followed by her tattered skirts. Balanced between him and the wall, pressed hard against her spread legs, his hips started moving, jerking against her, as his fingers sought to open his trousers.

Musky, carnal sweat overpowered the scent of dead pigman and Theda’s hand joined his in drawing out the hard shaft straining the inside of his patchy trousers. The long-legged jackanape was well-endowed, and firm as hot stone.

“Tell me another limerick,” she told him as she stroked his twitching cock. His wiry body shuddered and tensed, and he leaned into her, pressing the soft face of his mask against her neck. Damp cloth touched her and teeth pinched her skin through fabric.

Theda positioned her hips so that his shaft crushed against the tender slick between her thighs. He grunted softly.

“There was a... noble from Fitz,” he said in hot, moist puffs against her throat as they maneuvered, “whose wife was known for her-” a pop and a gasp, he was inside. “-Ah fuck _me_ this is tight.”

“That didn’t rhyme,” she panted. Theda might have been a little tense from her dry spell. As he regained his bearings, her fingers delved between her slippery folds to stroke her button and knead the swollen, aching flesh into pliability.

“Wit escapes me-” he grunted, panting into her neck, squeezing her thighs in his hands. “With my head ensnared as it is in your. _Hnng_. Tender... bear trap.”

“Hold steady,” she ordered, her hand working furiously, churning up heat and friction slicked by saliva and her own readiness. “That’s the way… yes…”

With his cock stretching her, and her sweaty back pressed against the sweating stone wall, pain and pleasure culminated in a sizzling, sparking fuse behind her eyelids. Or maybe it was the wormwood.

At that moment, Jaxx’s hands gripped her hips, and he jostled her so that her weight sank down his fine cock, inch by taut inch. The arches of her feet erupted in tingles and she bit back a growl. Shuddering, clenching and releasing, the hot waves of molten light crashed and washed over her.

No sooner had the climax receded did Jaxx prove that his claim of untiring stamina was more than just bravado. He crushed her hard against the wall, metal waist brace clanking against stone, cloth-covered face buried into her cheek, and drove himself deep. Her innards trembled and throbbed, and sparks danced at the corners of her eyes.

Narrow hips jackknifed between her hard thighs and the spiked whiskey breath buffeted the fabric of his mask. Their campfire had long smoldered to darkness, but Theda felt the light burning brighter inside of her, and lightening twofold with every crash of his body against hers. Wiry and slender Jaxx might have been, but Theda found in him a fighting spirit that equaled hers.

His thrusting body drove her hard against the stone at her back. While she only uttered grunts, Jaxx gave a breathy laugh each time his cockhead struck her deep. Maybe it was the bells heralding his every motion with rhythmic merriment, but Theda started laughing too, until the growing, hungry warmth in her belly brought her back to something more guttural and aggressive.

The Jester’s jutting hip bones battered her inner thighs, their sweat making skin slide almost frictionlessly. A dirty gloved thumb found its way to her lip. She sank her teeth into the digit and Jaxx bucked. With a hoarse yelp, his cock surged, and he forgot about her teeth, gasping and groaning as he pumped his hips and spilled into her.

Knobby knees buckled under both of their weight and his bare ass hit the floor, her weight sinking on top of him. Still panting, sweat beading her forehead, Theda rocked her hips to wring the last bit of fun from him until he was fully spent and she a second time.

She leaned down, her hair falling around her face and framing his, the fabric over his nose puffing out and sucking in with each fast breath, and she smiled, alight with hope. Even the darkness couldn’t reach her, now.

“You’ve earned your rest, fool. I’ll take second watch.”

\-----

While Jaxx slept, Theda served as sentry, honing her glaive with meditative calm in the darkness. She would need more intensive treatments to undo the damage of this venture, _if_ they ever made it back to the hamlet.

But for now, at least, she was back to her old self again. And maybe… together, they had a chance.

Upon his waking, both Jester and Hellion made fast work of mutually improving their spirits a second time.

By then, they were ready to face the pig prince. Half their original number, yet standing twice as tall.

* * *

 

_The Jester and the Hellion fair_ _  
_ _Battled the Swine prince without a care_

_So affrighted was he_ _  
_ _Of their bravery_

_His poor heart burst from the scare_

_\--------_

  
  
  



End file.
